THE ARTS & CRAFTS LIVING ROOM

From WILLIAM MORRIS to the COTSWOLD SCHOOL
A selling exhibition 

including a collection of Scottish paintings from a private collection

VIEW AS CATALOGUE

10 - 28 June 2009

“Where glowing embers through the room
teach light to counterfeit the gloom” Milton

 

Having previously exhibited the furnishings of the Arts and Crafts library, bed room and dining room, the Millinery Works now turns its attention to the room in a house that serves as a place to gather with the family, entertain friends, and relax.  This reception room to which one retires to read, converse, listen to music, knit, sew, play cards and, today more often than not, watch television has gathered more descriptive names than any other room in the house – the drawing room, the sitting room, the morning room, the lounge, the front room, the parlour and the living room.

The name drawing room was derived from the ‘withdrawing room’ - a term first mentioned in literature in the mid seventeenth century. Through the nineteenth and until the early part of the twentieth century it was the room to which the ladies withdrew after dinner to allow the men to indulge in matters considered unsuitable for the “fairer sex”- drinking, smoking, discussing affairs of state and political debate. The drawing room was also the place to entertain. 

The sitting room and the morning room were distinct from the drawing room in the larger Edwardian and Victorian houses; these were more for family whereas the drawing room was the more formal room for entertaining guests. However, by the mid twentieth century there was just the one room which was often referred to as the sitting room. By the end of the twentieth century the terms drawing room, sitting room and parlour had given way to the term most widely used today - the living room.

The furniture of this diversely named room consists today, as it has throughout, of comfortable sofas, settees and easy chairs, occasional tables, bookcases and storage for newspapers and magazines along with other items that suit the individual household – bureaus, display cabinets, plant stands, mirrors and pictures. The room was traditionally structured around a fire place incorporating a fender, fire dogs, a coal or log box and decorative fire irons.

In this exhibition there are some fine examples of these items dating from the turn of the nineteenth century made by the craftsmen, designers and workshops of the Arts & Crafts Movement and fitting perfectly into William Morris’s famous statement: ‘Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful or believe to be beautiful.’

Illustrated above exhibits 11, 25, 42, 50 & 72.

                                        FURNITURE

1. An Aesthetic ebonised and parcel gilt chaise longue with deep-buttoned upholstered back and seat in Jim Thompson Thai silk, in the manner of Christopher Dresser, circa 1875. 84cm (33in) high, 168cm (66in) long, 69cm (27in) deep

2. A walnut upholstered armchair with spindle sides and carved stylised flower decoration to the top frieze, attributed to E W Godwin, circa 1880. See “Secular Furniture of E W Godwin” by Susan Webber Soros p.126  ill: 171. 99cm (35in) high, 61cm (24in) wide, 66cm (26in) deep. 3. A two tier walnut and parcel gilt coffee table, the top with routed lines, designed by E W Godwin, circa 1880. See “Secular Furniture of E W Godwin” by Susan Webber Soros pp. 141-171 for variations. 71cm (28in) high, 38cm (15in) wide, 38cm (15in) deep.

For further information email art@millineryworks.co.uk

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